They would ask me what actors I saw in the roles. I would tell them, and they’d say “Oh that’s interesting.” And that would be the end of it.
--Elmore Leonard, in 2000, on the extent of his input for Hollywood's adaptation of his novels

Monday, April 4, 2016

Lucinda Riley's "The Storm Sister"

Lucinda Riley is the New York Times bestselling author of The Orchid House, The Girl on the Cliff, The Lavender Garden, The Midnight Rose, and The Seven Sisters. Her books have sold more than five million copies in thirty languages She lives in London and the English countryside with her husband and four children.

Here Riley dreamcasts an adaptation of The Storm Sister, the second installment in the seven book series, The Seven Sisters:

As a former actress, there is nothing more satisfying than the game of casting my own characters. I remember sweating before auditions in London, and then wondering what was going through the casting director’s mind as I read for a part. While my acting days are long over, I do so admire the young British actors of today. So for my main character Ally in The Storm Sister, I would have to choose Eleanor Tomlinson, who was so brilliant in the BBC adaptation of Poldark. With her vibrant red hair and feisty personality, she would really do Ally justice. Ally’s half-American lover and fellow sailor Theo would be played by Jake Gyllenhaal.

For all my sisters in this series, I imagine that their historical ancestor will be played by the same actress, as they are physically similar. So Ally’s great-great-grandmother Anna would also be played by Tomlinson, but perhaps with the voice of Birgit Nilsson, the wonderful Swedish soprano, as we hear Anna sing Grieg’s enchanting music in the first production of Ibsen’s Peer Gynt in 1878. A younger Alexander Skarsgård could lend that certain charm and edge to the musician Jens Halvorsen who Anna falls in love with.

Of course we catch glimpses of Ally’s five sisters in The Storm Sister as well. Maia, the eldest, finds her heritage in the heat of Rio de Janeiro, as told in the first book in the series, The Seven Sisters. Anne Hathaway is a perfect fit, with her large dark eyes, and her ability to express such intense emotion, as she did in Les Miserables.

I’ve given the reader a little look into Star’s perspective at the end of The Storm Sister. Her own story, The Shadow Sister, will be available in the US in Spring 2017, and I have imagined her to look rather like Léa Seydoux (who was most recently in Spectre). I think she would portray Star’s shy intelligence wonderfully.

For the other sisters: CeCe would be played by the talented Australian Aboriginal actress Jessica Mauboy, Tiggy by the beautiful Lily Collins, and Elektra by the British actress Gugu Mbatha-Raw.

As for the elusive seventh sister … well, I can’t reveal anything until the very last book in the series….

“Compared to a novel, a film is like an economy pizza where there are no olives, no ham, no anchovies, no mushrooms, and all you’ve got is the dough.”
--Louis de Bernières, author of Captain Corelli’s Mandolin